Hope
by CuriousCaitx
Summary: When the world ends, all you have is hope. A story of the walking dead, surviving, and the romance between two people in the middle of it all.
1. Chapter 1

Prologue

Hope. Hope is fuel. Fuel for action, thought. Fuel for the capability to live. We keep going. We keep moving and fighting. Living. Why? Because we have hope. This is us: human beings living on hope, because we have nothing else. When the world ends, it's what we live for, fight for, and die for. When there is nothing but ourselves and others to live for, hope keeps us together. Losing hope is losing the will to be alive and to keep going.

I am hopeful. I hope for better days when I can go somewhere alone and unarmed. I hope for a time when I am not constantly afraid for my life or the life of others. For a world where the walking dead is again just a made up movie, book, or television show plot. For a time where I can fulfill dreams I had before the apocalypse that shattered them.

All we can do is hope.

Chapter 1

My name is Ashly Stone. Before this all began, I was just another random high school senior shooting for scholarships and doing the best I can to be on top of everything. I worked semi-hard in class, doing all my work to the extent where I made all A's, but never hard enough where I was an overachiever. I had a bright future ahead of me.

Then this happened: an awful virus hospitalized many people all over the world. The number of people in the hallways at school, on the street, or anywhere for that matter, dwindled until half the population was either in the local hospital or being transported to a nearby one, because frankly there wasn't enough room. Eventually, hospitals simply ran out of beds and hallway space to stuff people. They set up clinics where they could find volunteered space and kept the dreadfully sick people there.

The awful part about this virus is that there were no survivors. Everyone who got it died. Nobody knows how it was spread, but there were theories. The first was that it was contagious like a cold. People began carrying around baby wipes and hand sanitizer everywhere. Then, a scientist on the news suggested it was airborne. Of course everyone donned filter masks at that point.

Everyone freaked out because scientists were just as clueless as they were. They performed test after test after test, still without any idea of what the virus was or how to fix it. The whole epidemic craze lasted about 3 days.

Then, everywhere, the dead walked. They shuffled their way out of the morgue like their heart never stopped beating. And they were hungry. Not for a good cheeseburger or some potato chips, but human flesh. The morgue workers were the first to go, and then nurses and doctors and other patients. A lot of people escaped and called the cops, scared out of their minds. The SWAT team came, the CDC, the CSI, the FBI, the bomb squad for heaven's sake. They quarantined the whole building, keeping the dead-but-somehow-still-alive flesh-eaters inside.

Of course the media was all over it. They called them zombies, which seems completely silly, but that's what they are, really. Zombies. The people reacted to this accordingly. They boarded up their houses, fled to abandoned cabins in the woods (those were the smart ones), and rioted. The riots were outside the various quarantined hospitals, demanding the zombies be exterminated. The officials were brain-farting, because there were also a ton of people who didn't want the zombies killed. The zombies were of course still people, and maybe there could be a cure. It was unlikely, but the problem of what to do remained for 4 days.

Then a mistake was made. The order was given in the United States to kill the zombies, cause y'know, we're apparently heartless. Or survivalists, but whatever. Squads of men carrying guns obliviously ran into the hospitals. A lot of the zombies were gunned down, but I think they underestimated the number of zombies, or the strength, or something, because the soldiers were eaten. The dead walked into the cities with nothing to stop them but a few brave surviving officers. They may be slow, but they were relentless suckers.

Within a week the whole country was infected. Stores closed the day the zombies escaped, and so did everything else. People ran to their families. Somehow, infected (stupid) people flew over seas and it wasn't long, maybe a month, before everywhere else in the world was filled with insatiable zombies.

Where was I in all this? In a small town in Kansas, scared to death. When the virus started, I lost a lot of friends to it, so the days following were ones of mourning. Then, as the zombies escaped from the clinic in my tiny hometown, I ran. It was all I knew to do. I got in my car and drove. My mom had been at work and I drove there first. She was a lawyer in a tiny law firm in a tiny town in a tiny building located on a tiny intersection. I found her. She was dead. I couldn't even cry until I was 5 miles away and speeding like crazy towards my best friend's house, leaving behind the intersection slowly becoming filled with zombies.

When I found her, she was thankfully alive. Zombies crowded around her house. I was so distraught, so scared, so angry, that I drove my car right into her living room and she, crying with relief and scaredness, climbed into my car and I shot out of there. Julie and I drove forever before we actually spoke. I hadn't realized it really, but I had driven onto the interstate going north. I had blocked out everything on that drive. The scenes, everything. I knew what it would be. Wrongness. Dead people walking and eating people. Burning buildings and dead bodies, ripped apart. I focused on the yellow lines, and that's it, for the longest time.

Now, we are still driving. It has been exactly 2 hours since the zombies escaped and started eating and infecting other people. My car is almost out of gas. "We need gas." These were the first words I spoke to Julie today. They sounded croaky and awful.

Julie looked over at me, her eyes red from crying. From that look I knew her family hadn't survived. Her brother and mother had gotten the virus at the beginning. I didn't dare ask what happened to her father. "Okay," she said quietly. I reached over and squeezed her arm. To reassure her or myself, I'm not sure. I need to know she's alive, and here, with me. Not dead. Not a zombie. She is real. Knowing it gave me the strength I needed to pull off the interstate and into a gas station. To stop gripping the steering wheel until my knuckles were white, and to stop driving forever and ever.

Amazingly, I was able to use my credit card to get gas. Thank God for automatic gas pumps. I looked around while Julie stayed in the car. The place was completely deserted from what I could see, except a couple abandoned cars, a Camaro and some other car I don't know the name of. No cars passed on the interstate and no people moved around in the town I could see from here. I was nervous and jumpy, afraid a zombie would appear. Then my stomach growled, and I realized I was utterly starving. Leaving the gas nozzle hanging on the side of my car, I opened the driver's side door and looked at my best friend. "You hungry?"

She just shook her head, and I slowly closed the door and walked hesitantly toward the small store at the gas station. Normally when we were together we couldn't shut up, we talked nonstop about whatever. I could confide in her anything, which was why she was my best friend. Now, it was different. We had both suffered terrible losses in this tragedy. There wasn't much to say. Nothing much we could bring ourselves to say.

I pulled the door open and the little bell rang, making me jump five feet in the air. After I calmed down, I forced myself to walk into the store. No one was in here, of course. It was quite eerie to see the various items neatly stacked on the shelves and the cash register still running and the lights still on, but no one was here at all. The door wasn't even locked. Maybe the person working at the time ran to their loved ones. I would have, that's for sure. Who cares about work when the world is ending?

Cautiously, I walked to an aisle containing candy bars and muffins and pop tarts and nutrition bars and pretty much everything you can think of. I grabbed a classic brown sugar cinnamon pop tart and then walked to the freezers at the back (which were also still on) and grabbed two Mountain Dews. Thinking ahead, I decided to grab a plastic bag from behind the counter and stuff it with food and a few drinks, along with whatever else we might need. I didn't know how long we'd be driving or to where for that matter, but we would need sustenance. Feeling slightly guilty about not paying, I began to exit the little store.

My heart along with my movement stopped when a door at the back squeaked open. I even held my breath. The door was to my back and I couldn't see what or who came out, but it didn't matter. I was having a mini heart attack all the same. All I could think was that it was a zombie and it was going to eat me now. It was going to tear me to shreds and maybe then _I _would become a zombie, too. Emotionless, hungry, without pain or feeling. I almost welcomed it. I had lost so many people dear to me. I didn't want the pain anymore.

Then I heard a voice. A male voice, speaking. Not the moaning or gurgling of a zombie, but a voice. I was way too scared to comprehend what the voice said, but it gave me the ability to turn around. It was a man. Maybe a few years older than me, like twenty or twenty-one, standing there, pointing a gun at me. "What?" I squeaked, eyes wide.

He lowered his gun. "I said, hello."

"Hi." Feeling like I was about to faint, I set my supplies on the floor and simply sat down where I was.

The man walked over to me and squatted down. He had long-ish dark brown hair that fell almost to his shoulders and swept over his eyes. Built like a swimmer, lean and a little muscular, way taller than me. But it was hard to tell with him squatting and me sitting. "You okay?" He asked.

He stood and offered a hand, pulling me up when I took it. "I think," I replied. "This is just... a little overwhelming."

He laughed bitterly. "Indeed, it is." It was a little comforting to be near him. Who knows why. I just felt better. Maybe it was the concern he showed for me.

We stood there just looking at each other for at least a whole 2 minutes before one of us talked. It was me. "Why are you holed up in a gas station?"

The man laughed for real this time. "I just ran. I ended up here. I planned to stay here until I figured out what to do." He looked at me with golden-brown eyes. "What are you doing?"

I began to speak, but stopped. What _am _I doing? I have no plan of action, nothing. "I don't know," I answered honestly. I pointed at my SUV. "My best friend is in my car. We were driving to no where in particular. Just away."

He stared at me for a few seconds, and the nodded. "I understand." He picked up the plastic bag and handed it to me.

"Thanks." I half-smiled at him. He smiled back in full. I made a split-second decision. "Do you want to come with us?" I don't know what made me ask, some unseen force. Maybe it was because he made me feel better, or maybe it was because he would be a lot of help with that gun of his. The latter of which I noticed had been stuffed into the back pocket of his jeans.

"Yes," he answered quickly, then blushed, "I mean- I... I don't even know your name."

Realizing this was true, I held out my hand and said, "Ashly Stone."

He shook it. "Gabe Foreman."

I hadn't thought about it before, but the only goal I have in life now is survive. I realize the more people in a group the more chances of staying alive. I need Gabe as much as he needs me. "So how about it?"

Gabe let go of my hand, a thoughtful expression on his handsome face. "Yes," he said. "I'll go."

We walked together out of the store and towards my car. Through the whole exchange I had managed to forget about my losses (my mother, my friends, my life even) and it suddenly hit me again as we got to the SUV. I managed to compose myself before I started crying. I opened the door to the back seat, threw the plastic bag in, and Gabe climbed in on the other side. I thought Julie would freak out, but I saw she was asleep. I climbed in behind the wheel and shook her awake. "Julie." She slowly opened her eyes, and I saw they filled with disappointment. She must want to go back to whatever dream she was having.

"This is Gabe," I told her and pointed at the guy in the back seat. She turned around, surprise clear in her expression.

"Alright," she said slowly. She shook his hand when he offered. "Julie."

Gabe nodded at her with a small smile, "Nice to meet you."

She looked at me, confusion on her face, and I said, "He's going to come with us. If I'm right, he has no where else to go." I looked at Gabe and he nodded.

"Where are _we_ going, exactly?" Julie asked. The sleep seemed to have done her good. She was a bit more upbeat, like usual.

I cranked the car and put in drive, pulling out of the gas station, looking both ways down the road only out of habit. "I have no idea," I replied grimly.

* * *

**Reviews are an epic invention, and the action should be repeated often. (:**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

We were passing the border into Nebraska when I started to doze. I attempted to sit up straight and keep my eyes wide open, but the effort was almost painful. Noticing this, Julie volunteered to do the driving for awhile. I gratefully accepted, pulling off on the side of the interstate and switching with her, my eyes shifting cautiously around the empty farmland. No zombies were here, but there was hardly ever any people before, either. Once I was on the passenger's side, I reclined the seat and was asleep as soon as I shut my eyes.

A few hours later, I woke up to the sound of Julie crunching on a nutrition bar. She offered me one out of the plastic bag, but I turned it down. I had eaten the pop tart I got at the gas station while driving earlier. I pulled my seat forward and looked behind me at Gabe. He was fast asleep, hunched against the window. It was night now, the dark making me uneasy. It felt like there was more danger when there wasn't sunlight to reveal it to our weak eyes.

"I've just kept on driving," Julie said suddenly. "I have no idea where we're going."

"Manitoba," I said. Julie glanced at me confusedly. "In Canada. My dad lives there." I had decided right after we picked up Gabe that I needed to see my father. I needed to know if he was alive. My parents had divorced when I was twelve, and I used to visit my dad every summer up until three years ago. I haven't seen him since. He's all the family I have left now.

"Sounds.. good." Julie flexed her fingers and said hopefully, "Maybe the zombies haven't spread to Canada."

"Maybe," I agreed. It was wishful thinking, though. As we've seen on the news, the virus spreads like wildfire, eating up everyone in its path. Literally.

We were halfway through Nebraska when I realized the urgent need to pee. I told Julie and she pulled off the interstate on the next exit into a small town. Then slammed on the brakes. The headlights of my SUV fell on a group of zombies shuffling around the entrance to the town mindlessly. I swallowed the urge to gag when I saw them... and what they were eating. There were five in total. Well, four and a half. Three of them feasted on a rather large man, tearing at his flesh with their blood-stained teeth.

"Go," I whispered to Julie. "Gogogogo."

She was in shock, staring at the zombies with a death grip on the steering wheel. I nudged her shoulder and she finally put it in reverse and flung the car up the exit. I looked back and saw the zombies' empty eyes look up and watch us until we were out of sight. You could say my need to pee wasn't _that _urgent.

Gabe woke up when we reached South Dakota. I heard him rummage around in the plastic bag for food. "Pass me a Mountain Dew?" I asked. He obliged and I thanked him.

"So what's the plan?" He asked, mouth full of peanut butter crackers.

I turned around to face him and smiled when I saw him. He faintly resembled a chipmunk. "Manitoba, Canada."

"Why Manitoba?"

"It's where my dad lives," I replied. Gabe nodded in understanding. I had to wonder what happened to _his _family, but I for sure wasn't going to ask.

I opened the Mountain Dew and almost chugged it. "The drive to Morris, Manitoba is about a 14 hours," I told them. "We're only half over."

"Ugh." Julie sighed next to me. "Are we going to be able to stop somewhere and sleep?"

I thought about it. I still needed to pee, so we _do _need to stop, but would it be safe to stop and sleep? Maybe we could barricade ourselves in a motel, but do we really want to take that chance? "I don't know." I looked at Gabe. "What do you say?"

"Only if we can find a nice deserted place with heavy doors and big locks," he replied. He ran his fingers through his shiny brown locks, and I suddenly wished I could touch his hair. I shook the feeling quickly.

"I guess we'll just keep a lookout." I sat back in my seat, resigned.

My two companions agreed and we kept driving. To keep ourselves from thinking too much, we ended up comprising a plan. We decided we would sleep the night in a motel around Fargo if we found one, get up around nine in the morning and get going around ten. Gabe offered to drive the rest of the way, since he hasn't done any driving yet. It's nine at night right now, and if we leave from a motel near Fargo at ten, we'll make it to Morris around lunchtime. It felt a lot better to have a plan in all this mess.

We made it to a town ten miles from Fargo, North Dakota at midnight. We drove off the interstate, and we must have been blessed because no zombies walked around the tiny motel or the gas station next to it. Thankfully, the two structures were far from the town. We pulled into the parking lot carefully and slowly. Julie turned off the car, and we sat there for a bit, reluctant to leave the safety of the SUV. Finally, we got out and walked to the main office.

The process of getting rooms was easy enough. The office wasn't locked so we walked right in. The place was very small, just enough room for an over-sized desk and a dying ficus. The keys to the rooms hung on hooks behind the desks. It felt wrong, but I grabbed two keys to rooms right next to each other. I kept one and handed the other to Gabe. Silently, we carried our exhausted selves up a flight of stairs outside the main office and found our rooms.

"Goodnight," I said to Gabe as he started into his room.

His eyes lit up even in the dark as he smiled. "Night, Ashly."

I calmed the fluttering of my heart, blaming it on the paranoia of a zombie walking in on us while we sleep, and followed Julie inside our room.

In the morning, instead of waking up to the alarm clock I set, I woke up to scratching on our door. I looked over to the bed beside mine and Julie was still asleep, bundled in the scratchy motel sheets. I hesitantly rose from the bed, and walked to the door. I could hear my heart beat in my ears, and I hoped with all my might that it would be Gabe outside. Of course, more wishful thinking. When I glanced out of the peephole, I saw a gray-skinned man. A stringy mop of bloody hair sat on his head, and more blood dripped out of his mouth. A hand missing three fingers scratched on the door. Could he smell us? Were there more zombies? Closing my eyes I tried to shut out the awful image of the zombie, but failed as it settled behind my eyelids.

Backing away from the door, I whispered, "Julie. Wake up." I walked over and shook her, my eyes never leaving the door.

"Wha-"

"Shhhh!" I pointed at the door. "Zombie."

Her hazel eyes widened with fear. "What're we gonna do?" She jumped out of bed. We were both still clothed in the same clothes as yesterday, not having packed any luggage at all. A change of clothes was definitely the last thing on my mind as I left home.

"I don't know, wait?" I tried not to sound as scared as I actually was.

Julie started crying a little. She's always been pretty emotional. "I knew this was a bad idea." She plopped on the bed, dropping her head in her hands to hide her tears. I sat beside her, my hand resting on her shoulder.

I definitely don't want to come this far just to be eaten in the end. I haven't gotten over my losses, but I know now that dying won't make it all better. I felt like crying myself.

Two gunshots, one right after the other, rang outside our room. I jumped up and ran to look outside the window by the door. The dead man was laying face down outside the door, a hole in his head and in his shoulder, and Gabe stood outside his room with his gun, shirtless. I blushed in spite of myself.

As I walked outside and faced Gabe, I became very aware of how unattractive I probably look right now. I shrugged it off and stepped over the zombie, which was hard to do mentally. To his surprise, I gave Gabe a quick hug. Two days ago, I would have never hugged a stranger, but this whole end of the world thing brings people to together, I guess. I was pretty distraught. But not as distraught as Julie, who followed me out of the room and sidled past the dead zombie, her eyes red.

"We need to go," Gabe told us, tucking his gun in his back pocket. "I don't really know, but the shots might attract more zombies." He ran inside and returned with his shirt halfway on.

Julie and I hurried down the stairs without argument. The farther away we are from here, the better. I was a little disappointed though, because I wanted to restock some food and drinks from the gas station, but after talking to Julie and Gabe, they agreed to stop somewhere once we were a good distance away. It's not like the zombies could chase us in the car, but it felt better to be far, far away from them.

"We need weapons," I informed the two. I hadn't thought about actually fighting off the zombies before, just running away. I realized, though, that if I wanted to survive, I need something to defend myself. "We have your gun," I said to Gabe, "but that'll run out of bullets. Julie and I don't have any weapons at all either."

"I once read on the Internet that axes and crowbars are good zombie-killing weapons," Julie suggested. At our blank stares she said, "I _do _read."

I laughed. She does look like a ditz with her blond hair and bubbly-ness, but she's really actually kinda smart. People always assume I'm the smart one of our little duo, because I'm passive and I _don't _have blond hair. My hair is a dark, dark brown. "I'm sorry, but I'm short on both at the moment."

"We could check out the next gas station for sharp things while stocking up on food," Gabe said from driver's seat. Julie was in the back and I sat beside Gabe. "And I'll bet there will be a gun behind the counter in case of robbery or something."

I nodded. "Sounds like a plan." The clock on the dashboard read 8:34, so I assumed we'd reach Morris an hour earlier including the stop.

"How big is Morris, you think?" Gabe inquired.

"It's small. Small enough to where everybody knows everybody," I told him. "Like back home." I looked at Julie, and I regretted saying it because I could see she became sad. I was homesick, too.

"That's good. Going into a big city would be suicide," he said. I realized he probably thought all this through many times. He was the perfect guy to have in a survival group. It gave me hope.

In the hour we drove away from the motel, nobody spoke again. It gave me time to think, and I didn't like it. The world was ending, I hadn't seen but a few living people since we left Kansas, and I was starting to have the dreadful feeling that it was just us, tromping down the interstate, the only living people in the world. But I knew that was ridiculous. If _I _could survive, if Julie could, others could, too. I wondered where they were. Were they hiding? Were they driving to find loved ones like me? There were no zombies on the interstate, I would have thought it would be a popular place for the living. But the number of cars we've encountered has dwindled until the interstate was completely abandoned.

Finally we stopped at a gas station that wasn't part of any town, and wasn't near any civilization, which made me happy. Gabe filled up the gas while me and Julie walked into the store in the gas station. We grabbed a few plastic bags sitting on top of the counter and filled them with food and drinks. I found some t-shirts and grabbed three, just in case. Believe it not, Julie found a small hand ax hanging on one of the shelves. She ripped the plastic covering off and held it up like she was about to swing.

"I definitely cannot imagine you using that," I laughed. She grinned. I began to walk to the back of the counter to check for a gun, and stopped dead in my tracks. A dead body lay on the floor, and as I backed away it rose, back facing me. "Oh, God," I whispered.

Hissing, the woman zombie turned to face me, spattering blood at my feet. She was quicker than other ones I've seen, and I found this out as she grabbed my arms with her decaying hand. I screamed.

I saw Julie run for the back door out of the corner of my eye. "Ashly, run!"

I kept screaming and kicked with all my might, slamming the zombie in the stomach. It flew back against the counter and I took off out the back behind Julie. I slammed the door shut, but had enough time to see Gabe run in and shoot the zombie between the eyes. Shaking, I sat down against the concrete wall and cried, the gun shot ringing in my ears.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Once I had settled down, I got up from my pathetic position on the ground and wiped the tears from my face. We more than lucked out on our search for weapons, because Gabe had found an abandoned police car behind the gas station, where there was a classic cop handgun, a Glock (with 2 boxes of ammunition), and a shotgun on a rack, fully loaded, with buckshot ammo in the glove box. "Good for close-range," Gabe commented.

We put all the ammo in a bag and Gabe handed me the Glock after making sure it was loaded and on safety. "Um, I have no idea how to even begin using this."

Gabe laughed. "Just aim down the barrel and shoot steady."

I put the gun in my back pocket, still shaking a little. "Easy enough."

Gabe ended up giving Julie his gun and keeping the shotgun for himself. Julie wrinkled her nose at the idea of using the gun. "Hey, it's better then hacking the things with an ax," I told her, and she agreed fully.

We gathered up all our groceries and ammo and headed out. Julie kept the ax... just in case. With a full tank of gas, we kept North, running into no more trouble until we reached Morris...

The town was overrun. We entered Morris at a suburb off the interstate not too far from my dad's place. Zombies idled and walked around aimlessly, and cars with no one in them sat with their doors open. Some were wrecked beyond repair and some covered in blood. Gabe eased the SUV onto the street, attracting attention from the infected monsters. They ran at us, and he slammed on the accelerator. "Oh my God! I thought they were slow!"

"Me too!" I shouted, heart pounding. The zombies sprinted at full speed towards us, blood and saliva dripping out of their mouth. Their arms were reached out for us as they ran. "Maybe the virus mutated or – or.. I don't know, maybe they're just slow when they first turn -"

"Who cares! Just go!" Julie screamed, her eyes glued to the zombies behind us.

Gabe swerved around abandoned cars and more and more zombies joined the ones chasing us. Houses zipped past and I spotted smoke and fires in the distance. The monsters chasing us couldn't keep up, but more replaced them everywhere we went. "Here! Go left! Left!" He swung a wide left at my command and I directed him until we were on my father's street.

"Ashly," Julie said to me calmly (or as calm as you can be with tireless zombies chasing you), "your dad-"

"Don't," I told her firmly. My dad was strong, he _had _to have made it.

She just looked at me sadly and I ignored it. "The yellow one. There." I pointed.

Gabe slowed down and stopped at the edge of the road in front of the only bright yellow house on the street. I jumped out immediately, the handgun up and aimed the way we came. There was no need, the zombies had lost us. Without checking to see if the two were following me, I walked to the house. The front door was wide open and I just knew he wasn't here. But I walked in anyway.

Memories washed over me and I almost became overwhelmed with them. I pulled myself to together and trudged through the foyer and into the living room. "Hello?" I called.

It was highly unlikely that he was still here, but I wasn't giving up. The living room was undisturbed. Obviously no one had been here for awhile. I moved on to the kitchen, which was the opposite. Smashed dishes and various kitchen objects littered the tiled floor. Worst of all was a trail of blood leading out the back door, which had been completely ripped from its hinges and rested on the floor amongst everything else. I backed out and refused to believe the scenarios that popped into my head.

"Ash?" I flinched as Julie called for me.

"In here." My voice was dead and it scared me.

She walked in with the gun aimed in front of her, and dropped it when she saw the mess. Her hand went to her mouth. "Ashly, I'm so sorry..."

"This doesn't mean anything!" I shouted unintentionally. I didn't mean to yell at her, but she had such little faith! I know my father, she doesn't. He wouldn't be caught like this. He wouldn't.

A hand settled on my shoulder and I turned to see Gabe. "Come on. Let's check upstairs."

I followed him up the stairs, and we checked every room, the last being the one that was reserved for me during the summer. In it, the walls were a pale pink. Not my taste, but my dad didn't know. A bed sat in the corner across from a bay window and a dresser, while posters lined the walls to make it homey. I sat down on the bed and sighed. "He's not here."

Gabe and Julie sat on either side of me. "He could've gotten away," Gabe offered.

"I sure hope so," I said quietly.

We ended having lunch there, at my father's house, raiding his wrecked kitchen. The power was still on, but I doubted this luxury would last very long with the world going to crap. We used the stove to cook macaroni and cheese.

"God, I love this stuff." Gabe whole-heartedly dug in. I picked at mine, worried about my father.

Julie shoveled the food in her mouth. "Come on, Ash, this might me the last time you ever eat mac and cheese!"

The thought only depressed me. There would be a lot of food I would never eat again. A lot of things I wouldn't experience. Books I won't read, movies I won't see. People I won't meet. The thought was enough to make me lose my appetite completely.

We relaxed in the living room for awhile, enjoying the non-cramped space after being stuck in a car for hours on end. We couldn't stay long, though. Soon, the zombies would find us, and we'd run. We would run and run. We couldn't ever stop, because stopping would mean dying.

"Where are we gonna go?" I asked no one in particular.

Gabe and I took over the two recliners my father had while Julie claimed the couch. "Somewhere with out zombies?" Julie suggested.

"No duh." I laughed, temporarily forgetting the source of my stress.

"How about... the middle of nowhere?" Gabe asked.

I thought it over. "That wouldn't be hard to find in Canada... but we need supplies. We couldn't live just on what we have now, and we would eventually run out of food anyway. I think... we should keep moving. Staying in one place is too risky. We could easily be overrun with zombies."

Silence rested over us for a few minutes and then Gabe spoke up, "You'd think the military would have made a few safe zones."

I sat up. "Maybe they have! But how would we find them?"

"We need like a radio or something," Julie said from her position on the couch. "There could be some kind of broadcast, don't you think?"

"It's possible," Gabe said. "Did your dad have a radio, Ashly?"

I tried to remember and came up with nothing. I was pretty sure he never had one though. We could have tried the radio in my car... except I didn't have one. It was stolen three days ago, and I hadn't had the chance to replace it yet. "I don't know. Maybe... Wait! A police scanner. Would that work?"

Gabe jumped up. "Take me to it!"

I led him to my dad's bedroom and took the thing from a drawer in the dresser. I set it on top of the dresser and let Gabe fiddle with it because I was completely clueless when it came to that. A few minutes later and we got a good amount of static going on. Which is the equivalent of nothing.

He sighed. "Oh well. Something could be interfering. We'll bring it with us and keep it on."

"I don't know if I can handle the static."

Gabe chuckled and turn the volume down until it was almost inaudible. I smiled and walked out of the room. He grabbed the scanner and followed.

A few minutes later the three of us were standing at the doorway, looking out the window beside it at the two zombies ambling around my car. "Here's your chance to get some action with the guns," Gabe whispered to us. "Julie, you shoot the smaller one. If you miss, try again, but that's your last chance. Ashly, you take the other one after Julie shoots, if I'm right, they'll be coming fast. _Don't hesitate_. These things aren't human anymore." He looked at us and we nodded in understanding. I didn't think I'd have a problem shooting the zombies. They're monsters, driven by the need to eat our flesh. It's kill or be killed.

"If you both miss, I'll get 'em with my shotgun." He held it up, ready to fire already as if he expected us to screw up. Maybe he did.

Without giving us any time to think, he flung the door open. Julie quickly held her gun up as the zombies turned towards us and took aim. She shot, hitting the zombie in the arm. Blood splattered the side of my SUV, making me wince. "I got it! I actually hit it!"

"Great, now keep shooting!" Gabe yelled behind us. The zombies were sprinting, now only three car lengths away.

I aimed down the barrel like he told me and tried to keep as still as possible as I shot. The bullet hit the zombie in the neck and it went down... then got back up. I aimed again, for the head specifically. I shot him clean through the skull, causing blood and brain matter to fly out the back of its head.

"A natural," I heard Gabe comment. I didn't know if it was a good or a bad thing that I could easily shoot someone in the head. I guess in this case, a good thing.

Julie, on the other hand, was not a natural. The zombie ended up getting too close and Gabe took over, blowing its entire head off. The zombie fell to the ground, blood pouring from its decapitated body. There are some things you can't unsee. "I'm not very good at that," she pointed out, dryly.

"You'll get better," I said.

"Thanks, Little Miss Natural." She made a face at me and I laughed.

We hurried to the car, making a wide berth around the gruesome bodies, and I got in the driver's seat. We decided to go back to the United States. We didn't know anything about the Canadian military, but the U.S. military will for sure have set up some kind of haven for refugees. If they survived.

We set the police scanner in the floorboard of the passenger seat where Gabe sat now. The dull sound of static almost drove me crazy at first, but I eventually got used to it.

Three hours into the drive we stopped at a gas station on the side of the interstate just into North Dakota. We filled up and also topped off several gas cans and put them in my trunk, realizing that the gas pumps probably won't be turned on for much longer with no one to keep it going. With no zombies in the area, we decided to eat dinner also. It consisted of ham sandwiches, chips, and carbonated drinks. The ham we got from my dad's, along with other foods. The other foods were nonperishable though. We just really wanted some ham.

While we ate our sandwiches in my SUV, parked in an abandoned gas station, I began to realize how crazy all this was. I mean, I realized it was pretty messed up before, but... Seriously, zombies. We've been running from zombies. People who have been infected and reanimated and become obsessed with eating live humans. It was crazy. I was 18 years old, just about to graduate. And bam. Zombies. Way to ruin my life. But what could I do? Nothing. I wasn't a super-smart scientist who could find a cure to the virus, or a bad ass fighter who could take down armies of zombies by myself. I was a regular teenager, stuck in the middle of an apocalypse with no where to go. It has forced me to grow up. Technically, I was an adult, but it never felt like it until now.

"Ready to go?" Gabe snapped me out of my reverie, and I nodded.

I cranked the SUV, put it in drive, and drove. I drove because there was nothing else I could do.

* * *

**Well, this may not be surprising, but I know hardly anything about police scanners. But this is fiction, and it will work however I want, so ha. (: **


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

It was surprisingly hot for the middle of Spring. We ended up turning on the air conditioning around the late afternoon, when the three us started to sweat a little. We had been driving for a whole day now from Morris, taking shifts between sleeping and driving. The interstate was empty as usual and we had no real destination. I was pretty sure we were somewhere around Colorado. The scenery included deciduous forests and tall mountains. It was beautiful, but it was hard to appreciate the beauty during an apocalypse.

"Has there been anything on the scanner yet?" I asked Julie, who sat in the passenger seat next to me. Gabe was asleep in the back.

I glanced at her and she shook her head. "No, nothing." I sighed.

The police scanner has been useless since we got it from my dad's. The only thing it has accomplished is ingraining a low buzz in my ears that I was convinced would stick with me even when it was turned off.

Julie kicked her feet up onto the dashboard and whined, "I really want a shower!"

I ran fingers through my dirty hair and wished the same thing. "I wonder if there's running water anywhere."

"Maybe," Gabe said behind me through a yawn.  
"Morning, Sleepy Head," I grinned at him in the rear view mirror. He smiled back at me, making my heart do a flip.

"We could rough it," Julie said. "Take a bath in a creek or lake somewhere. Anything to get this gross feeling off."

"We'll have to take an exit. Do we want to risk it?" I asked.

Gabe held up his shotgun, "We have plenty of firepower. We could take turns and stand guard for each other."

I decided a nice bath would be worth it and nervously took the next exit. It took us into a small town, which looked to be deserted, but we still sped through in the car. Soon we were on back roads surrounded by mountain valleys and trees. A lake shouldn't be hard to find.

And it wasn't. Within half an hour we found one, not too far from the road. It stretched at the foot of a mountain and ended at a small forest of shadowy trees that made me uneasy. I parked the SUV on the side and we cautiously got out and walked to the lake. I grabbed a travel shampoo, soap, and a couple small towels from the car we had gotten at one of the gas stations. Gabe had suggested it then, always thinking ahead.

"First!" Julie shouted happily. I stuck my tongue out at her and handed her the bath stuff.

"We'll stand guard then," Gabe said, holding his shotgun. I had my gun with me as well, and I fiddled with it as we stood with our backs to Julie. I heard a splash and a squeal, and she exclaimed how cold it was. Cold or not, a bath would be quite rejuvenating.

Gabe went next, handing Julie his shot gun once she was dressed, and he was through quickly. I ignored how weird it felt to undress and bathe in the shallow part of a lake while your friends stood guard. I throughly washed and dried off with one of the towels, feeling a lot better.

"Whoa, guys, look!" Julie suddenly said quietly. I walked up beside them and squinted to see what she was talking about. A figure moved in the distance, coming from the opposite way we came off the interstate. It looked like a person, emerging from the trees and walking out into the valley.

"Is it a zombie?" I asked.

Gabe shook his head, "I don't think so... Look how he's walking."

I squinted again and saw what he meant. The person wasn't stumbling or weaving around like a zombie. He was walking with a purpose. What that purpose was, I did not know, but we were going to find out.

"Are we just gonna wait?" Julie asked, exasperated. "We should go!"

I looked over at her. "I want to know what he wants." Whoever this person was, they made me curious. Not only that, but they were the first person we would come into contact with for two days. I did not want to miss the chance.

Julie eventually sat down and I joined her. Whoever he was, he was sure taking his time. As he got closer I could make out a burly old man wearing a plaid button up shirt (sleeves rolled up to reveal weathered forearms), camouflage pants, and boots. A scraggly gray beard stretched to his chest and hid most of his tan, wrinkled face. A black duffle bag was thrown over his shoulder and a shotgun much older than the one Gabe held was slung over his back.

"Hello, folks!" A rough, deep voice yelled once he was in ear shot.

I waved and Gabe returned the hello, but not with as much excitement. The old man stopped when he was right in front of us and grinned with yellow-ish teeth. Bright blue eyes pierced us under his bushy gray eyebrows. "Now, you can put that there gun down, boy. I'm not gonna do you folks any harm."

Gabe slowly lowered his shotgun and waited for the old man's next move. Which was to stick his hand out to him. "Eli Harris," the old man introduced himself.

Gabe shook his hand, still clearly wary. "Gabe Foreman."

Julie and I rose and offered our names as well. The old man nodded to us, still smiling. "Nice to see other survivors 'round here," he said to us.

"We're actually from Kansas," I admitted.

"Ahh. Well I don't guess you kids could do an old man a favor?" Eli looked hopefully at us all.

"It depends," Gabe said. "What's the favor?" He studied Eli with cold eyes.

The old man looked up at the snowcapped mountain above the lake, sighing wistfully. "My daughter lives over in Utah. I was wonderin'... maybe y'all could let me get a ride? It's not too far from here, maybe a few hours, I'd figure." He stroked his beard thoughtfully. "I know it don't seem like a very appetizing idea, but I got pride and I'm not gonna beg."

Gabe looked at me and so did Julie, and I realized it was my choice. We were all in _my_ car, and it seemed I _was_ the one calling the shots. The revelation surprised me, because I never considered myself much of a leader, but keeping us together seemed to be my job.

I looked sympathetically at Eli. His blue eyes seemed to go straight to my soul, and I was sure he knew the answer before I said it. "We'll do it. We've got room in my car, and it shouldn't be too much trouble. I won't turn down another human being, not when the world is in a state like this."

"Thank you, little lady," Eli said to me, relief apparent in his voice. "Thank you so much."

"It's not a problem," I told him and smiled.

I looked at Gabe and saw that he was smiling at me and I knew I made the right choice.

The three of us plus our newly added companion trudged up to my car. Gabe volunteered and drive and I claimed the passenger seat, leaving Julie and Eli to sit in the back together.

"So what's your daughter's name?" I heard Julie ask Eli once we were back on the interstate headed West.

"Ellen," he answered proudly. "She's like you. Blond hair and blue eyes."

"That's nice," she said. They struck up a conversation about Ellen and other miscellaneous things, and I half listened to that and half listened to the tune Gabe was quietly humming as he drove.

Two hours into the drive, I spotted something off the interstate in the fading light that made me think. A Wal-Mart.

"Hey guys," I spoke up. "What do you say about raiding a Wal-Mart?"

Gabe glanced at me, surprised. "That would be insane. How many zombies do you think are in there?"

"No one would've been there at the start, and that one back there looked small anyways. There are some things we need that we can't get at gas stations." I told him.

"Yeah," Julie agreed. "It's getting pretty close to the end of the month, and that's a problem for me and Ashly." I laughed. It was true, though.

"And, we can't live off of junk food. Also, clothes are something that would be very nice to have." That got them.

"Fine." Gabe pulled a quick U-turn and flew off the exit to Wal-Mart. "But if we get eaten by zombies, don't blame me."

"Don't you worry," Eli said happily. I turned to see him patting his old shotgun. "This here is a zombie killing nightmare. We'll make it through."

"I sure hope so." I looked anxiously at the large building in front of us. The parking lot was almost empty save a few cars, and only a faint light escaped the doors. The sun dipped below the horizon and soon it would be dark, but this was our chance. We were walking into a potential zombie trap.

* * *

**Short and sweet, I guess. (: I'll try to make the next longer, which I doubt will be too hard considering what they're about to get themselves into. **


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Walking up to Wal-Mart, an uneasy feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. I knew doing this was crazy, zombies could be crawling all over the place in there. Looking around, no undead were about, but that didn't prove anything.

Once we were all in front of the doors, we stood there for a few seconds, like we expected the automatic doors to actually open. They didn't, of course.

"Stand back, kids," Eli said quietly. We took a few steps back, and he aimed his shotgun at one of the doors and pulled the trigger. The glass shattered immediately, and Eli loaded his gun with another shell. "There you go."

We were about to step through the broken door when fast, irregular footsteps and moaning were heard. At least four zombies emerged from the shadows, running at full speed toward us. I realized the loud shot would have attracted them.

"Everyone back! Shoot them!" I heard Gabe yell to my left.

I stumbled backwards, throwing up my gun and aiming at one of the zombies who were now just about twenty feet from the door. Two went down from a shotgun, Gabe or Eli, I didn't know. I could hear Julie shooting, and missing. My heart pounded in my ears and I seemed to have tunnel vision, focusing only on the zombie I was trying to shoot. I pulled the trigger, and half of the zombie's head was blown off. The last zombie still ran, but I guessed he didn't have the common sense to step up over the metal in the door, because he tripped and hit the ground. A man, blood and saliva spewing from his mouth, crawled as fast as he could towards us, staring at us with empty eyes. Gabe took the shot that killed him, almost point blank. Blood spattered on my shoes and the bottom of my jeans, and I had to step back before the blood pouring from his head reached me.

It all went by so fast, it took me a minute to recover. I tried to stop my hands from shaking and failed.

"That was a close one," Julie commented.

I nodded. "I believe I am forever traumatized." I wasn't even joking.

Gabe put his arm around me and started walking towards the building, "Come on, shopping will make ya feel better."

I laughed, "I never really liked shopping all that much."

We entered Wal-Mart carefully, watching out for more zombies. I kept my gun raised the entire time. I noticed the electricity in the store was off, and I wondered if it was off everywhere else. The only source of light was the battery-powered emergency lights. "Should we split up, or stay together?" I asked.

"We could split into pairs. Meet up back here in like forty-five minutes," Julie said happily. I looked at her and saw an idea forming in her eyes. "Me and Eli will go look around, and you and Gabe can pair up."

"But it would make more sense if-"

Julie grabbed Eli's arm and started walking away, cutting me off with, "Have fun!" She turned around for a moment to wink at me. I really hoped Gabe didn't see that.

When I turned to him, he was grinning hugely. Oh yeah, he saw it. I looked away so he wouldn't see me blush.

"Shall we?" He asked.

I laughed nervously and took the arm he offered to me. "We shall," I replied.

The two of us headed the opposite direction of Julie and Eli, towards the clothes. Our guns were at the ready as I browsed the women's section for a new shirt and pair of jeans. It felt weird to walk around Wal-Mart with guns like it was a normal activity.

Eventually, I chose a t-shirt with a cool graphic design and the most stylish pair of jeans you can get at Wal-Mart. Though I didn't think style really mattered when the world was ending.

Gabe found some clothes of his own, jeans and a casual button up shirt, and we made our way to the dressing rooms to change. We took turns guarding each other, so we wouldn't have any surprise attacks.

"So," Gabe said as it was my turn to change after him. He stood right outside the door. "Who were you?"

The question surprised me. It wasn't 'Who are you?', because it was true I was no longer that person. "A high school senior. Just about to graduate." I sighed. It felt so weird to think I was in high just a few days ago, I felt so much older now.

"Interesting," was his reply. "Were you getting any scholarships?"

"Yeah," I said. I took off the bloodied jeans and threw them in a corner. "Pretty damn good academic scholarship. No use now, though."

"So you're smart."

I shrugged as I pulled the new jeans on, even though he couldn't see it. "I'm okay."

I heard the wood groan as he leaned against it. "I didn't try in high school. Went to college for a year and dropped out." I listened intently. We hadn't really gotten into conversations about our lives before the zombies, and I've been wanting to know about him. About who he was and what he did. "I'm twenty and I was living alone, working a crappy job at an auto shop. My life was pretty much going nowhere." A sigh reached my ears.

"I bet you could've gotten pretty far," I told him, slipping off my shirt and putting on the other one. "And I'm not just saying that."

He was quiet for a second. "Thanks."

I looked at myself in the mirror before I walked out. I didn't look any different than two days ago, but I sure felt different.

"Somehow, I don't think the bloody sneakers go with my outfit," I told Gabe as I opened the door.

He didn't say anything as he looked at me for a moment. "Well, we'll have to fix that, won't we?" He smiled at me and took my hand, leading me towards the shoes. My hand in his felt right, and it created butterflies in my stomach.

I knew I had feelings for Gabe, but I also knew that developing a relationship at this time could end very badly.

Once I had some nice, new sneakers, we ended up wandering around, looking for any necessities. I pointed at toilet paper, "We probably need that. Stopping at gas stations every time we need to go is a waste of gas. Which we only have three cans left of, since the gas pumps don't work anymore." They had stopped working sometime yesterday, making me grateful we had filled those gas cans before. Gabe grabbed a pack of six rolls and we kept walking down aisles in the food section.

I grabbed things like beans, soup, canned peaches and pears. Stuff we could eat that wasn't junk. I put it all in a cart I found in one of the aisles. Since we needed something else besides carbonated beverages, I also got juice boxes and bottled water. Lots of bottled water.

"Oh hey," I turned to Gabe. "Can you run back and get some vegetables? Like carrots or something? Stuff we can eat out of the can."

Gabe looked reluctant. "I don't wanna leave you alone..."

"Just go, I have a gun. I'll be fine." I smiled reassuringly as he hesitantly started jogging back and out of sight. His genuine concern for me made the butterflies in my stomach do some flips.

I continued on to the next aisle, and almost kept going when I realized it was all just junk food, but then I saw someone. A silhouette in the dim light. I regretted my next move.

"Gabe?" I called. A few seconds later, I found out it was in fact _not _Gabe.

A zombie emerged from the shadows. It was a boy, no older than twelve. I knew he was a zombie because blood poured from his mouth and his dead eyes watched me hungrily, but as he walked towards me, he didn't stumble or drag his feet and no moaning escaped his lips. He seemed like a normal person, besides the blood-covered outstretched arms. This confused me and froze me, and I unconsciously thanked God the zombie didn't run, or I would be dead.

As he got closer, maybe fifteen feet away now, I heard a breathy sound coming from his mouth. Ten feet away, I heard something that shocked me and made my heart feel like it was being squeezed. Through the roaring sound of blood rushing to my head, I heard the zombie _speak_.

"Hu... H- Hung... Hungry... So... Hungry... Hungry..." It sounded like a normal kid, besides the fact it was practically feral. My whole body shook. This zombie was different than all the others. It was more human. This fact kept my hands frozen, unable to shoot.

Only when the boy zombie was almost close enough to touch me did I have the sense to back up quickly. Forgetting the cart behind me, I backed into it, unable to go farther. I shut my eyes tight, knowing I was about to be eaten.

Then a gun shot sounded, and I felt blood splatter on my new clothes and heard a body drop to the floor. Opening my eyes, I saw Gabe. He looked angry.

"What were you thinking, Ashly?" He shouted at me after lowering the shotgun. "You almost got killed! Why didn't you shoot him? Your gun is _in your hand_!" I flinched and looked down. He caught me by surprise and hugged me. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you, but... Jesus. If I had been just two seconds later..."

I buried my face in his chest. "He spoke..." I said quietly.

Gabe took my shoulder and pushed me back so he could see my face. "What?"

"The zombie," I said and pointed at the body of the boy. "He... spoke. He said 'hungry'."

Gabe looked doubtful. "But... they're brainless. There's no way."

"I promise he did," I told him. I wanted him to pull me back into his arms, but he kept me at arms length as we spoke.

He looked away and then back at me, and then down at my clothes. "We can talk about it later. Let's go get you changed. Again."

The talking zombie haunted me as I walked back to change once more out of bloody clothes. The little boy had spoken actual words. 'So hungry'. It wasn't mindless groaning like the zombies I'd experienced the past two days. The longest two days of my life it seems. Those zombies, the ones that were slow at first and now are able to sprint like Olympic runners (Well, very clumsy Olympic runners) were brainless, like Gabe said. They didn't speak, they were animals. They made animal sounds and ate people like animals. This boy though, didn't seem as much like an animal to me, but a human, ridden with a terrible disease.

We met back up with Julie and Eli after I changed. They had gotten clothes for themselves and stuff like blankets and pillows for sleeping and bathroom toiletries, besides toilet paper. "I got some tampons," Julie whispered to me and I laughed.

She pulled my arm and we dropped back behind Eli and Gabe as we walked towards the entrance with our cart. "So. How'd things with Gabe go?" Julie grinned at me.

I rolled my eyes at her, but couldn't help smiling. "Nothing happened, Miss Matchmaker."

She looked throughly disappointed. "Aw, come on, Ashly. He's hot! You should do him."

"Oh my gosh!" I laughed and shook my head. "You know there's more to relationships than sex."

"There is?" She asked jokingly, and winked.

Suddenly, Gabe and Eli were turned around and running back. Eli ran past us and Gabe grabbed our arms, dragging us backwards. "Go!"

"What?" I asked, pulling my gun out of the back of my jeans.

"It's them zombies! There's a whole lot of 'em out there. I dunno if they seen us," Eli informed us.

The four of us ducked behind an aisle and crouched down. "I think they might've heard the gunshots and came running. Or maybe smelled us. Who knows." Gabe loaded his shotgun and pumped it.

"How many?" Julie asked, sounding panicked.

"At least fifteen."

I gasped involuntarily and dropped my head into my hands. "What are we gonna do?"

"There's no way we can take that many zombies," Julie said, her voice shaking.

"We're good as dead," Eli agreed.

Gabe spun around to face us. "No. We can get through this."

Julie continued to freak out and Eli sat quietly. I did my best to believe what Gabe said. That we would get through this. We would stay alive. After two whole days of surviving the apocalypse, I was not giving up. This was the first time, though, that death seemed not too far away. We handled other encounters well, but this was the four of us up against fifteen raging, fast, hungry zombies.

"Are any inside?" I inquired, trying not to seem too scared.

Gabe shook his head. "I don't think they realize one of the doors is open." He shrugged. "Hopefully, it'll stay that way."

"What if it doesn't?"

He didn't answer for almost a whole minute. I only heard our quiet breathing, and a faint moaning in the distance.

"We'll fight through them all and get to the car with our stuff... or die trying."


	6. Chapter 6

**Hello readers. (: I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience of a very slow update. I've been on vacation in Florida, and I come home to a broken computer. I'm using my mother's crappy laptop at the moment to tell you this. I've written a short preview of the 6th chapter of Hope. I'll delete this once I have the whole thing written and put the actual chapter up as soon as I can. Once again, I'm sorry. Have a cookie for your troubles -gives virtual cookie- (:**

* * *

Chapter 6 (Preview)

The distant moaning of the zombies as we sat, helpless, was enough to drive someone crazy. We had been here for fifteen minutes at least, but it felt like hours. The only thing I could think about was the impending inevitability of me dying.

"Duh!"

I turned to look at Gabe. He had been sitting silently, a calculating expression on his face. Now he seemed excited. "What?" I asked him.

"The back door. There's always a back door. We could sneak through there." He shifted so that he was facing all of us.

Eli looked doubtful. "We'll still have to go around the front to get the car, boy."

"Of course, but... Well, let's get away from here. We'll figure it out once we're out of the building." Gabe stood, and held a hand out for me. I smiled and took it, heaving myself up.

"What about the groceries?" Julie piped up.

Gabe started toward the entrance where we left the cart abandoned. "I'll get 'em," he whispered. His footsteps were silent as he walked. When he reached the cart, he grabbed the handle and walked backwards, as slowly as possible.

I realized I was holding my breath and released it in a sigh of relief as he reached us. We walked quickly and quietly to the back of the store.

We ended up having to navigate through the back and duck under a halfway open loading door. The four of us paused to take in the cool air, a relief from the stuffy indoors of Wal-Mart. The moon was high in the sky and stars twinkled down on us. At least that hadn't changed.

"There's our escape." Gabe pointed to a large truck, an eighteen-wheeler. The Wal-Mart logo decorated the side of the trailer.


End file.
